Qualcomm has debuted the latest version of its Snapdragon hardware, set to power most flagship phones in 2025.
Called Snapdragon 8 Elite, the new chip will appear inside upcoming phones from Asus, Honor, iQOO, OnePlus, Oppo, Realme, Samsung, Vivo and Xiaomi.
We won’t have to wait too long for some of these designs to launch and there will certainly be plenty of exciting upcoming phones before the year is out.
Xiaomi’s Adam Zeng announced on stage at Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Summit 2024 that Snapdragon 8 Elite will come to the Xiaomi 15 Series first – before the end of October. Honor Magic 7 is also confirmed to launch on 30 October in Shenzhen. Both of these devices will surely come to Europe, too – but at a later date.
It certainly seems it’s also nailed on that the Galaxy S25 will be using Snapdragon chips again rather than Samsung’s own Exynos.
The key thing is that the new chips use the Oryon processor that we saw in Snapdragon PC chips earlier this year (indeed, it’s a second-gen version of that tech which is 30% faster). And, given the clear performance enhancement there, it’s no real surprise. This technology – bought by Qualcomm when it bought start-up Nuvia in 2021.
Qualcomm showed benchmarks that compared its performance favourably compared to the Apple A18 Pro inside the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max. The 8 Elite represents a 62 percent uplift in performance compared to the last generation and it’s 45 percent more efficient too.
Improvements to the Hexagon neural processor are designed to speed up complex AI models integrated into your phone as well as those in other apps.. As we know, AI models are a massive disruption taking place at the moment and Qualcomm talked up how it is well placed to take advantage of this shift.
“Computers can now understand the language of humans. It’s going to change the way we think about Gen AI (Generative AI)” says Qualcomm’s chief Cristiano Amon.
“Today we have an app-centric experience but that is changing because each application and use case has the potential to change how we think about AI. Computers can understand human language. It’s going to change in a way that is easier to think about. And it’s going to lead to new experiences.”
In an AI demo, Amon showed a demo of a banking app where your current balance is part of the purchase process on another site or where you’re asking your device to pay a bill. Of course, this won’t necessarily just take place over mobile; Qualcomm says it’ll take place across the platforms it deals with including PC, spatial computing (though its work with Meta primarily) and auto.
CCS Insight analyst Leo Gebbie says that the AI battle on mobile is hotting up. “An arms race in Al on mobile is in photos and imaging is underway.
“Features such as generative Al image fill and object removal have quickly spread across leading smartphones today and video now looks set to be the next battleground.”
By adopting the Elite name, Qualcomm has given its mobile chips similar nomenclature to its Snapdragon X Elite and X Plus PC chips. So expect the mid-range spin of the 8 Elite to be called the 8 Plus. That’ll be with us for mid-range phones part way into 2025.
